The company behind a poll that Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass touted as showing her with a double-digit lead in the mayoral race said the survey was entirely fake and part of a social experiment.
Last week, Bass made a post on X showing a poll putting her at 50% and her rival Nithya Raman at just 39%.
“Doing the work, showing up, and gaining momentum. Let’s do this, LA!” her post said, with a picture of the poll results.
There was only one problem: The poll was entirely made up and posted as part of a self-admitted “social experiment” from a fake polling company.
“All previously published polling releases have been withdrawn and should not be cited or treated as genuine polling data,” Median Strategies said in its press release, which was sent in response to repeated inquiries from the Los Angeles Times.
“Median Strategies was created as a short-term social experiment examining how purported polling information could enter and spread through the political information ecosystem without independent verification,” it added.
Bass has since deleted her post extolling the poll.
The poll itself had all the markings of a genuine survey, even providing a methodology, margin of error, and a detailed breakdown. It claimed to have polled 560 Los Angeles voters between July 30 and Aug. 5, and had a 4.1% margin of error.
“Faced with a choice between the incumbent and a Democratic Socialists of America-aligned challenger, most Pratt voters appear to be treating Bass as the more familiar, more moderate option rather than sitting out the race,” Median wrote in an analysis viewed by the Los Angeles Times.
A spokesperson for Bass defended the mayor to the California Post, noting that the survey had been “reported on by multiple news outlets,” then called for those behind it to be prosecuted.
“Any bad faith attempts to influence elections should be investigated and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” they told the outlet.
Bass was far from the only person or group duped by the phony poll. Rick Taylor, a veteran political consultant, told the California Post that the poll was shared among political operatives, and there was “no reason for anyone to have doubted it.”
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“Whoever is responsible for this ought to be exposed, and we need to make sure this never happens again,” he said.
Actual polling in the race is scarce, but most analysts believe the Nov. 3 runoff election will be competitive.